


Light Up My Life With Your Fire

by subtextismygod



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Did I say mutual pining, Fluff, Getting Together, I Will Go Down With This Ship, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, M/M, Mighty Nein, Mutual Pining, caleb is gay for molly, caleb's past is sad, fire is important, like a lot of mutual pining, molly is super awesome, molly wants to help
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-04
Updated: 2020-03-04
Packaged: 2021-02-23 06:29:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23007202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/subtextismygod/pseuds/subtextismygod
Summary: Caleb Widogast feels strangely enraptured with the purple tiefling that he's met. He feels a connection to him like never before.Something is different about how Mollymauk looks in the firelight.Fire reveals all.
Relationships: Mollymauk Tealeaf/Caleb Widogast
Comments: 4
Kudos: 115





	Light Up My Life With Your Fire

The sound of the crackling campfire and loud cicadas kept Caleb from sleeping. The sounds were so different from any in Rexxentrum or the Sanatorium, and they did not help to stave off the nightmares that haunted his sleeping hours. He preferred to stay awake, in any case.

Careful to not wake the little goblin girl next to him, he slunk out of the tent, wrapping his scarf around his neck once for the comfort and warmth of it. The night was colder than he had anticipated, but he did not want to return and get his coat, wary of waking Nott at this hour. If she had little sleep, she would become positively feral the next morning. At least he could be by the fire. 

It was about midnight, he gathered, since Mollymauk was still on his shift. The purple tiefling was warming his hands over the fire, his elaborate coat lying on the ground next to him. He, apparently, wasn’t affected as much by the cool air, since his flowing white silk shirt was left untied and the neckline lay very low over his chest. As soon as he noticed Caleb’s approach, he looked up and smiled. “Ah, Caleb, by what god do I owe your presence?” With a swift movement, he swept his coat to the side and beckoned Caleb to sit by him.

Caleb smiled in return. The tiefling had been kind to him, and, in some way, he had become a staple in Caleb’s life. It was a strange feeling, he had realized, to be willingly reliant on someone. “The god of nightmares,” Caleb replied with a wry smile. 

The warmth of the fire did nothing to heat him up. If anything, it made him feel colder, more distant. He curled his knees to his chest, trying to preserve as much warmth as he could. Mollymauk, as perceptive as he was, easily noticed the movement. In a fluid motion, he draped his coat over Caleb. The smell of him wafted off the fabric, smelling of flowers and pines. “How long have you had nightmares?”

Forever. At least, it felt like it. “Ten years,” he only said. “Maybe more.” To his surprise, Mollymauk chuckled. 

“I’ve had them for as long as I can remember,” he said, almost angrily. As if he were bitter at the world’s choice to give him those nightmares. “Dreadful things. Memories from… I don’t feel like myself when I dream.”

“ _Ja_ ,” Caleb replied. He knew the feeling, though he had the exact opposite problem. “I feel too much like myself when I dream. Everything is too… it is too real.” The fire danced before him, mesmerizingly small. Not anything like the blazing inferno that had decimated his life, that had caused him to collapse in on himself. This fire was almost too innocent, too kind. 

Mollymauk said something quietly under his breath and sighed deeply, one of his hands reaching up to brush over some of his older scars. He stared at his two swords on the ground, the swords that had drawn his own blood and gave him those scars.

“Pardon?” Caleb asked. “You said something?”

Mollymauk straightened, pulling his gaze away from the swords and dropping his hand into his lap. “It’s just something I… someone I knew used to say. ‘Everyone has demons. Some are just more visible than others.’” Caleb resisted the urge to look at the bandages on his arms, the ones that covered years’ worth of scars and wrongdoings. He didn’t reply, but instead stared deeper into the fire, watching the little tongues of flame lick at the sky.

In the back of his mind, he heard their screams, the screams of his parents and his own as he burned them alive. Or maybe… maybe his screams had been later, when he had been locked up. Maybe he had screamed then, but stayed silent that night. He was still piecing together those moments, the parts that his mind had mercifully erased from his memories. So mercifully, but he still wanted to know the truth. Know exactly who he was and what he had done.

He was so deep in thought that he didn’t notice Mollymauk leave and return, a small wooden instrument in his hand. When he sat back down, Caleb caught a glimpse of what he assumed to be some kind of pan flute but… different. A different shape with more holes and parts. 

Hesitating for only a moment, Mollymauk put the flute to his lips and began to play.

The melody was haunting, ringing through him and digging deep into his bones. It was a lilting song that sounded remotely fey, like something that would play in the feywild, something almost too preternatural to be of this world. Yet it was still beautiful, still deeply moving with what felt like years of depth and knowledge. 

Up and down it went, flowing like a river through him as he felt himself get lost in the sound, feel his heart begin to beat just a little faster and his face feel a little warmer. A tugging string seemed to pull him closer to Mollymauk, wanting to see him for real, see him for who he was truly. In a way that was not of his own accord, he shifted a little closer to the tiefling, almost touching their arms together. As a delayed reaction, he realized that Mollymauk was actually very beautiful, in a calm and collected way. He had very handsome features, and he hadn’t really noticed that before.

Mollymauk hadn’t seemed to notice Caleb moving closer, being fully focused on his music. But, in a subtle shift, the melody became lighter, more open and more enthralling. Something seemed to make it change from a darker, deeper feel to something that sounded like hope. After a few more minutes of the music, he took the flute from his lips and stared at it in his hands, captured by a moment that had happened ages past. “I did not know you could play, Mollymauk,” Caleb said after a moment, barely raising his voice above a whisper. It felt like the music still hung in the air, and he did not want to ruin it with the sound of his voice. 

Mollymauk just kept watching the flute, tracing the small carvings in the wood. “In the carnival, you learn many things. It was something that passed the time while we were in between shows.” He paused for a brief second, turning the flute over and over. “And you can call me Molly. We’re friends, Caleb, and my friends call me Molly.”

“It was very beautiful,” Caleb said, “Molly.” A slight smile tugged on the tiefling’s lips, and he leaned closer to Caleb, resting their shoulders together. Mollymauk was very liberal with his touches, Caleb had discovered in the past. He hugged and leaned on people with very little reserve. But now felt different, a little tenser and a little more cautious. Caleb had tensed a little, too, when Molly had done so, something that had rarely happened in the past. He felt a sudden urge to take his hand, but he restrained. He had tried, and mostly succeeded, in not getting attached to people. In his experience, he just hurt people he cared about.

He moved away, letting Molly straighten and make a healthy, friendly distance between them. “I’m sorry,” Mollymauk said quickly. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.” He genuinely seemed to be worried that something he had done had triggered something in Caleb, brought up a wave of memories that he had rathered not revisit. Yet, it was somehow the exact opposite. It had brought something to the surface, yes, but not the thing that Molly had thought. In truth, Caleb had noticed the way that his skin felt electric whenever Molly touched him, had noticed how his stomach often fluttered when Molly smiled. And he had noticed, right then, how his heart had always beat a little quicker and ached a little more when Molly had clearly cared about him.

“You did not,” Caleb assured him, trying to think up a suitable excuse for his actions. “I… I am just tired,” he finally said. He was not good at lying, that was for sure, but Molly did not press. 

Part of him wished that he would. That he would be forced to tell him the truth about his newfound feelings. But he swiftly dismissed the notion. He would not risk hurting someone he cared for again.

Molly’s hand rested on his shoulder, bringing him back to the present. “What’s wrong?” He was very perceptive, Caleb would give him that. And, there was that ache in his heart again when Molly well and truly cared. 

He forced himself to look content, to look only a little tired. “Nothing. I am fine.” Once again, he found himself hoping that Molly would pry in a little more. He wasn’t going to tell him, but… there was a certain feeling that came with him trying to talk to him, trying to help him. A certain sense of belonging. Once again, his damned heart had that sharp ache when Molly looked at him with sad and caring eyes.

“If you ever need to talk, Caleb, I’m here,” he promised, squeezing Caleb’s shoulder a little bit. What felt like an electric pulse shuddered down his arm and back and sent butterflies racing in his stomach. 

“ _Ja_ ,” he replied, nodding his head convincingly. “Same for you.” A moment later, Beauregard pushed out of her tent, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. 

“My turn on watch, Molly,” she grumbled, shrugging on her blue coat. “Get some sleep.” 

At the same time, both Molly and Caleb said, “I’ll take the next watch.” Caleb looked over to Molly, who had turned to look at him in turn. He looked at Molly, hoping that he would see the unsaid words in his mind. The begging that he did not want to go to sleep, and would much rather spend the rest of the night talking with Molly. To his credit, he noticed Caleb’s desperate look and glanced back at Beau.

“We’ll take the watch,” he told her with a smile. “Can’t sleep anyway.” She shrugged.

“Let me know if you need me to take over,” she replied, then turned back into her tent she was sharing with Jester. 

Both Molly and Caleb were silent, neither of them acknowledging the choice they had both made. After a moment, Caleb started nudging his feet around in the dirt, making little patterns and shapes. “Thank you,” Caleb finally said, “for staying with me.”

Molly’s face seemed to soften for a second, hiding some emotion too complex for Caleb to decipher. “Of course,” he replied, staring at the rings on his fingers. “I’m… I always enjoy your company.” 

That was a new thing. Never before, or at least, never since he had killed his family, had someone just plainly enjoyed his company. He was always guarded, always hidden, yet somehow Mollymauk still enjoyed speaking with him, learning about him and keeping him company when needed. That was a new kind of friendship, one that Caleb had not had for a very long time. 

He only realized he had been silent for a while when Molly turned around and used one of his swords to poke at the flame. “I enjoy yours as well, Molly. A lot,” he said. “You are a very…” He fished around for a word that would not betray his feelings, but one that had truth in it. “You are a very enthralling person.”

Molly chuckled. “Well, I’m glad that my time in the carnival paid off for something. Always glad to perform.” He made a mock bow from where he was sitting. 

A cold wind swept through the camp, penetrating even the warm coat that Molly had lent him. Caleb shivered unconsciously, wrapping his arms around himself to gather warmth. The tiefling noticed the movement and moved closer, draping his arm around Caleb and pulling him close to share body heat. “Aren’t you cold?” Caleb asked, noticing once again that Molly only wore a single layer of a thin white shirt, and even then it was partially unlaced. 

He just shrugged, a dry smile on his lips while a dark and haunted look fell over his eyes. “I’ve been colder.” He shifted even closer so that both of their bodies were pressed against each other and he wrapped his arm around Caleb’s shoulders. Caleb tensed a little, his wall going up to keep from seeming like he was affected by the intimacy. “Is this okay?” Molly asked, noting Caleb’s discomfort.

He loved this. He loved being close to Molly, being right up next to him and resting his head against him, warmed by the body heat and the fire. He loved the feeling of warmth that filled his heart and the feeling of Molly at his side. “ _Ja_. This is fine.” 

Molly nodded, much more comfortable once he knew Caleb was okay. “Let me know if you want me to move.” Because Caleb’s comfort was more important than his own warmth. For the first time, he realized that a lot of things that Molly did were done for Caleb at the cost of something from Molly. Somehow, he had only now realized that, in Mollymauk’s eyes, Caleb always came first.

“Have you ever been in love?” he blurted out, horrified at himself being so vulnerable as soon as he spoke the words. 

Molly only sighed. “A long time ago. A lot has changed since then. _I_ have changed since then. I believe that I have been in love, yes. And now, those feelings seem foreign, paling in comparison to how I have felt recently.” He should have been satisfied with that answer, not said anything more. Yet, he felt himself being taken over by reckless abandon.

“As have I. It has been years. Decades, even. But I think that I have begun to revisit some feelings recently. That something has changed within me,” he said, watching Molly’s face intently for any sign of reciprocation. But he just remained impassive and neutral. 

“I don’t believe that I have ever really had someone… someone permanent,” Molly said after a moment, offering up another piece of his life. “I’ve wanted to. I still want to. But it’s never… nothing has ever stuck. No one I’ve ever met has been willing to be with someone with so much… so much everything. Baggage, I guess.”

Caleb almost felt like those words were directed toward him. Almost felt like they were for him. “I lost the first person I loved to myself,” he said. “I did some things, things that I regret so much. My actions cost me the person I loved.” He felt an urge to be truthful, to tell Molly the truth. It was odd, how he was being so reckless now. He felt such a deep wanting for Molly, a deep wanting of intimacy and closeness. He was willing to tell him so much, and that scared Caleb. “I do not want this to happen again.” 

“Caleb,” Mollymauk said cautiously. “Is something wrong?” The way he was speaking, it must seem to Molly like something was wrong, like Caleb was trying to send him a secret, subliminal message. He didn’t reply, unsure of how to do so. All that was there was the crackling of the fire. The screams that came with it. They almost sounded different now, like there were more voices layered over it. Like he was now afraid of losing more people to his failures.

“ _Ja_ ,” he finally said. “I think that…” he couldn’t finish it. He was so afraid of what Molly would say, the rift that could and would form between them if-- when-- Molly did not feel the same. He wanted to say: I think I am in love with you. But he could not. He couldn’t bear the idea of something changing between them.

He was too afraid of making the same mistakes. Molly rubbed his shoulder, hugging him close. “You don’t need to tell me,” he said. “If you want to talk, I’ll listen. If not, I won’t pry.”

That damned ache that stabbed through his heart was almost painful, almost something that screamed at him to do something, say something. And gods, he wanted to. So badly, he wanted to. He just stayed there, frozen. “If I do not tell you now, I know that I might never,” he muttered to himself. But Molly, damned Molly, heard him. 

“Tell me what?” Caleb buried his face in his hands, his cheeks beginning to turn rosy red. “Caleb, tell me what?”

He didn’t tell him. He couldn’t. No words that he could think of would quite explain the depth of emotions and feelings he had towards Mollymauk. He couldn’t even think of them himself. If he had time, if he had years and years in a library, he might have found the right ones, but not right here, not right now. Right now, all he could see was how the flickering light of the flame danced across the panes of Molly’s face, accentuating every inch of his face. He could only see the reflection of the flame in his blood-red eyes, dancing and leaping for the sky with radiant fingers. 

This was the first time he had seen fire in a different light. Not something destructive, something uncontrollable. That was his fire, the fire that he was in fear of every waking and sleeping moment. This time, this fire, it was beautiful, revealing. It was life, it was warm and welcoming. It was right. 

“Caleb?” 

The way Molly said it, so careful and so masked, broke something in him. Broke that little wall that had been cracking the whole night, every moment they had spoken a word to the other. 

And Caleb’s reservations, fears, worries, they all washed away in a wave of plain emotion. 

He reached over and took Molly’s hand, slowly and cautiously. And he held on as Molly stiffened for a moment, then held back. “Mollymauk…” He turned and looked at him, looked into the tiefling’s eyes for any sign of acceptance and reciprocation. 

Their eyes locked for a moment and there was something, something that was new there. Or… something that had always been there but always been hidden. Then Molly kissed him.

Softly, briefly, barely more than a light brush against his lips, but it told him everything and more. It told him that Mollymauk felt nervous, worried about them and how they would fit together. It told him that he was afraid of messing things up as much as Caleb was. It told him that, regardless of the confident, self-obsessed outer shell, Molly was still a very cautious person. He had said he had never had someone permanent. And it told him that Molly was hoping that someone permanent would be Caleb. 

And it told him that he was not alone in his feelings for Mollymauk. 

Part of him felt frozen in shock, frozen in the idea that someone fully cared about him no matter what he had done. But… Molly didn’t know the full truth of what he had done. He didn’t know the extent of the people he had killed and the blackness that tainted his soul like a shadow constantly looming over his life. He could not trust himself to not hurt Molly like he had hurt everyone else.

He pushed away, moving to sit on the other side of the fire, pulling his knees into his chest, Molly’s coat billowing out around him. The smell of the tiefling still clinging to it. Immediately, Molly’s vulnerability melted away and was replaced by his cold shell, full of his indifference. Yet concern still lined his face as he looked at Caleb over the fire. “I’m… I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have.” Caleb remained silent, his throat choking up. He felt tears nearly coming, preparing to betray him to Mollymauk. If he spoke, he knew he wouldn’t be able to hold them in anymore. “I’m sorry I assumed anything.” 

The regret that was palpable in his voice broke Caleb’s heart so completely. “Do not be,” he replied, almost pleading. Begging him to not believe that Caleb did not reciprocate. “I do not want to… I do not want to risk hurting you.” There it was, the plain truth, the last fear in between him and whom he had fallen in love with. And he had laid it bare before Molly, praying that he would understand the fear. 

But Molly’s face fell, crumpling as he averted his gaze to the fire, the sadness that he felt for himself and Caleb plainly displayed on his face. He said nothing. 

Caleb stood up, unwilling to hurt him any further, cause any more pain on his behalf. With short and stiff movements, he took off Molly’s coat, waiting to feel the weight of it and smell him on it, still lingering. Then he tossed it to the ground by Molly. “I am going to sleep.” 

Even as he walked away, Molly did not move, did not say anything. He didn’t call out for him to stay or even look at him. As soon as Caleb was sure that Molly wasn’t looking, he looked back over his shoulder to get a final look at him before everything he had hoped for would be washed away. 

Then he walked back into the tent, laying on the ground next to Nott, pulling his own coat over him like a blanket, already missing the soft and luxurious comfort of Molly’s coat.

__________________

He had not slept at all that night. Yet he was shaken from his trance of thought from Nott as the sun had risen from the horizon. “Caleb,” she said, “we’re heading out soon.”

“Thank you, Nott,” he replied, already woefully unprepared for what the day would offer. “I will be out there in a moment.” It satisfied her and she walked out of the tent, pulling up her hood and mask. She still had barely warmed to these people enough to be unabashedly a goblin around them. There was still her mask, the bandages covering as much of her skin as she could. 

With a sigh, he sat up and pulled on his coat after strapping on his books, the familiar weight at his side a welcome comfort. He stared at the tent wall for a moment, not deep in thought but not focusing on anything around him either. Just unready to leave the tent and face the consequences to his actions. 

He took a deep breath, another, then stood up and walked out. 

The light hit him harshly for a moment while his eyes adjusted, but once they did, he saw Beau and Jester both tossing backs into their wagon and Fjord feeding the horses. Yasha and Molly were over at the fire and were cooking food. Nott was nowhere to be found. 

Having already packed up his few items, he used magic to disassemble the tent and began to drag it to the wagon. “Oh, Caleb!” Jester called when she saw him. Quickly, she bounced over, her short blue hair bouncing up and down. “I can get that for you!” With strength that did not seem like it should come with someone of her size, she pulled it over her shoulder and skipped back to the wagon, shoving it into the back. 

A moment later, Fjord came from around the wagon, patting one of the horses on the back as he did. “Ready to leave?” he asked everyone in his thick accent. Caleb was slowly getting used to all the accents of the people around him. Only Molly’s was the one he was the most comfortable hearing.

The mere thought of Mollymauk sent a pang of distress through him, full of regret and anger, as well as the grief of losing his chance. He didn’t look over his shoulder at all to see Molly, who he knew was tending the fire with barely any heed to Caleb’s presence. 

Frumpkin mewled quietly at his feet and wound through them, hooking his tail around Caleb’s leg. Clearly, the cat knew something was wrong. Caleb leaned down and picked him up, letting him sit on his shoulder, scratching the top of his head softly. “Come get food,” Yasha called out. 

Caleb did not, instead making his way to the wagon and pulling himself to the edge, letting Frumpkin jump down and settle in his lap. He didn’t look up, just stared blankly at the top of Frumpkin’s head as he absentmindedly pet his familiar. He didn’t even hear Molly walk over and sit next to him, his horns uncharacteristically unembellished. 

“Caleb,” he began, his voice almost too quiet to hear over the racket of the rest of the Nein. “What you said last night…” 

“I do not want to talk about this, Molly,” Caleb quickly interrupted. He wasn’t fully sure he could hold up his resolve for any longer. 

“I just…” His voice drifted off as he traced one of the scars on his arm. “I wanted to say that I was sorry about last night. But… You would never do anything to hurt me. There’s nothing you could do to hurt me.”

That was love, in its purest form. The blind faith and trust in the other to do nothing to hurt you, to do everything right and flawlessly. Caleb was not flawless, nor was he right. He had hurt anyone he had ever loved, and it was only a matter of time until he hurt the rest of his newfound friends. He would not risk that being any more painful for the people he cared about more than anyone else in the world. Not Nott, and definitely not Mollymauk. He would not risk hurting them.

“I won’t push anything onto you,” he continued. “I’m not that kind of person. But… if you ever felt comfortable with… us… I’m always here.” He moved as if to get off the wagon, then paused for a split second. “I love you, Caleb.”

And he walked away. 

Impulse drove his whole body as he jumped off the wagon, displacing Frumpkin with little mind for his dear cat, grabbing the tiefling’s hand. And, this time, he didn’t let go. He just turned him around, pulling him close and tight, and kissed him.

He had always imagined something like this to be electric. He expected his heart to race, to explode from his chest. He expected himself to be burning with a blush and head spinning, his blood thrumming with the ecstasy of it. But it was calm. Everything about it was calm, solid. The world wasn’t spinning beneath his feet, but instead a rock-hard foundation for him to build up from. And as Molly melted into him, wrapping his arms around his shoulders and pulling him even tighter, Caleb felt more comfortable and calmer than he had for the past eleven years. 

And when they pulled apart, neither of them panting for breath as he had imagined, but calm and safe in each others’ arms, Caleb whispered a few words to Mollymauk, something for only him to hear and only ever for them to share. “I love you, Mollymauk.”

His fire burned brighter with the tiefling. But it was not destructive fire. It wasn’t the fire that engulfed a world and burned it all to ash. What that fire was, was life, and hope, and a steady burning of belief and warmth and comfort. It was home.


End file.
